Delete all items from a c++ std::vector

Question

I\'m trying to delete everything from a std::vector by using the following code

vector.erase( vector.begin(), vector.end() );

Answer 1

Is v.clear() not working for some reason?

Answer 2

vector.clear() should work for you. In case you want to shrink the capacity of the vector along with clear then

std::vector<T>(v).swap(v);

Answer 3

If you keep pointers in container and don't want to bother with manually destroying of them, then use boost shared_ptr. Here is sample for std::vector, but you can use it for any other STL container (set, map, queue, ...)

#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
#include <boost/shared_ptr.hpp>

struct foo
{
    foo( const int i_x ) : d_x( i_x )
    {
        std::cout << "foo::foo " << d_x << std::endl;
    }

    ~foo()
    {
        std::cout << "foo::~foo " << d_x << std::endl;
    }

    int d_x;
};

typedef boost::shared_ptr< foo > smart_foo_t;

int main()
{
    std::vector< smart_foo_t > foos;
    for ( int i = 0; i < 10; ++i )
    {
        smart_foo_t f( new foo( i ) );
        foos.push_back( f );
    }

    foos.clear();

    return 0;
}